Why Should We Use Plastic Bags Over and Over Again
Which type of purse should you employ to have your groceries dwelling house if you're trying to take equally little an impact as possible on the environment?
The reply might seem obvious: a robust and durable pocketbook that can exist re-used over and over again.
"If you lot're able to do that over a long time frame, and then you're going to have an environmental advantage," said Associate Professor Karli Verghese from the School of Architecture and Pattern at RMIT.
Simply the cardinal words there are "long time frame". Because you lot might be surprised past the number of times y'all accept to use these bags before they go more than environmentally friendly.
How many times should reusable bags be reused?
It's a bit complicated, because at that place are different types of reusable bags out in that location and different ways of measuring environmental impact.
But overall, reusable numberless need to be used at least 50 times in society for their environmental benefits to be realised.
That'southward co-ordinate to a 2009 study led by Dr Verghese, which considered what goes into creating unlike types of bags (the materials and their weight, as well every bit energy and water) along with how each of them tin be disposed (whether they tin exist recycled or whether they have to go into landfill).
Not surprisingly, it takes much more material and energy to create thick reusable bags than the thin single-use high-density polyethylene plastic bags that are given out for complimentary at supermarket checkouts — except in South Commonwealth of australia, Tasmania, the ACT and NT, where they're banned.
That's why Dr Verghese'south study institute that encouraging people to buy reusable bags without making sure these bags actually get reused an adequate number of times results in a worse event for the surroundings overall.
As an instance, if polypropylene bags (those dark-green numberless that yous can buy at the supermarket) are only used 52 times then their touch on on global warming is actually greater than that of single-use plastic bags.
How many uses should y'all be getting out of reusable bags? The report from Dr Verghese puts the figure at 104 — that's weekly for 2 years.
Then it might be worth keeping that in mind if you're tempted to purchase new green numberless when you forget to bring the ones you already own.
Which reusable bag is best?
2 of the most common reusable shopping numberless are polypropylene bags and polyethylene terephthalate.
Which of them is amend depends on which ecology bear upon mensurate y'all're looking at.
The polypropylene green bag has the everyman bear on on virtually measures including global warming, h2o use, land use, the release of nutrients into waterways and consumption of minerals.
Notwithstanding, the polyethylene terephthalate has the lowest impact when it comes to solid waste generated and fossil fuels consumed.
Whatever you practise, re-utilize and recycle
The environmental impact of plastic bags is reduced if they're used in other ways — as bin liners, for instance.
And once you're really done with them, Dr Verghese says you lot should "put them into a recycling collection system so they tin can exist redirected away from landfill and be put back into the economy".
You can find recycling collection bins for plastic numberless at the front of many supermarkets.
Supermarket shopping numberless not the only culprits
The expert work of using reusable bags at the supermarket can quickly be outweighed by the heavy plastic bags you're getting at other retailers.
"If you lot have a look at some of the plastic numberless that are given out by manner companies, they're pretty thick plastics," Dr Verghese said.
"At that place's a lot of focus on the supermarket shopping pocketbook but there's lots of plastic bags that are given out at lots of other shops."
Natural doesn't necessarily equal better, either
Yous might recall that paper bags are a more than environmentally friendly option than plastic bags because they're non made from synthetic materials.
But it's a mistake to think of products that seem "natural" as ameliorate, because paper numberless actually have a greater environmental impact than high-density polyethylene plastic numberless. Information technology's considering of the production procedure also as the amount of material needed per bag.
Notwithstanding, newspaper bags are the most recyclable and have less of an impact as litter.
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Source: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-05-24/war-on-waste-what-bags-to-use/8528350
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